EDITORIAL: Stand up for local food

These are fraught times for elected representatives of the once-quiet small towns of central and northern Ozaukee County. 

Look at the beleaguered Common Council members of the City of Port Washington. These part-time public servants are now the targets of expressions of fear and loathing from scores or even hundreds of protestors who disrupt their meetings to condemn their approval of the now infamous data center campus that is about to become a dominating presence on three square miles of city land.

But that is not the only controversy making life difficult for local elected officials. The governing bodies of three communities are embroiled in another divisive issue they worry will not be resolved without offending some of their constituents. 

The issue is chickens.

It’s tempting but, please, no joking about clucking or crowing or chickening out. This might not quite rise to the shuddering impact of dropping one of the world’s largest data centers into a small, scenic community, but it’s serious business. You can tell that from the way village and city officials are tiptoeing around it. 

The way it is being treated—like a dangerous-to-touch third rail of municipal government—might lead an uninformed observer to think the issue was about odorous, cacophonous chicken-based CAFOs (concentrated animal feeding operations) or flocks of caged chickens upsetting small-town ambience as well as animal rights advocates. 

But, no, it’s about four hens, the maximum number of chickens that residents of Saukville, Belgium and Port Washington would be allowed to keep in their backyards under proposals waiting for action in the those communities.

Saukville Village Board members are so wary of going on record for or against backyard chickens that they’ve decided to defer the question to voters in an advisory referendum. Opponents of the Port Washington data center who have been faulting officials for failing to submit the issue to a referendum will surely take note. See, they might point out, Saukville citizens get to vote on allowing chickens in their village, yet we have no say on letting a monster data center move into our city. 

In Belgium, the chicken issue was hashed and rehashed by the Village Board without a decision and then was dispatched to the Public Safety Committee, where presumably it was carefully vetted for threats to the safety of the community. The Village Board was expected to revisit the issue at its meeting this week.

When a Port Washington mother earlier this month asked the city to permit chicken keeping as a way for families to get a dependable supply of locally produced eggs and involve their children in the rewards of chicken raising (those adorable chicks), Mayor Ted Neitzke told her the council could not consider the issue now but might take it up in winter or spring.

Can you blame him? Dealing simultaneously with two issues as contentious as backyard chickens and a $15-billion data center may just be asking too much of citizen legislators.

For guidance in the chicken quandary, the dithering officials could consult with their peers in other Ozaukee communities. All of them allow their residents to keep chickens.

This includes the City of Mequon, the wealthiest community in the county, and the Village of Grafton, which has a population virtually identical in size to Port’s and allows its residents to keep not just chickens but also ducks.

Those municipalities, along with the other chicken-friendly Ozaukee communities of Fredonia, Cedarburg and Thiensville have two things related to the birds in common: Very few residents want to raise chickens and there are almost no complaints about those who do.

Regulations in those communities limit the number of birds, specify the location of coops and forbid roosters, which have the annoying habit of waking up at ungodly hours and announcing it loudly to their neighborhoods, not to mention causing a lot of stress in the coop by spending their days chasing hens.

The case for backyard chickens is strong. They’re a wholesome source of locally produced food and tending them is an enjoyable educational experience for families with children with little or no impact on neighbors. It should not be the business of local government to prevent its citizens from benefitting from it.

For that reason, a bill has been introduced in the Wisconsin Assembly to require all state municipalities to allow their residents to keep up to four chickens. (It apparently will be a while before it comes to a vote.)

Despite the upswell of support for urban chicken raising, officials of the communities facing chicken decisions do hear from a few constituents who want no part of poultry in their towns. 

Well, such are the perils of public service. But sometimes it takes courage to act for the best interests of citizens. 

It’s one of those times for the officials of Saukville, Belgium and Port. Do the right thing, declare chicken raising legal.